The Lost Hunter eBook

“We will be content with equal parts,”
said Mr. Pownal, smiling. “In this partnership
of affection none must claim a superior share.”

“Strange!” exclaimed Holden, fastening
his eyes on his son, and speaking, as was his wont
sometimes, as to himself, “that the full truth
broke not on me before. The heart yearned to him,
he was as a bright star to me; his voice was the music
of the forest to my ears; his eyes were as a sweet
dream, a vanished happiness, but I understood not.
It is plain now. It was the voice of my Sarah
I heard: they were her eyes that looked into
my heart through his. And was it not thy prompting,
mysterious Nature, that inclined him to me? Was
there not a dim revelation, that I was more to him
than other men? Else why delighted he in the
society of a lone, wayward man like me? Lord God
Almighty, no man knoweth the ordinances of heaven,
nor can he set the dominion thereof upon the earth!”

CHAPTER XXXII.

Welcome pure thoughts, welcome ye silent
groves.
These guests, these courts my soul most
dearly loves:
Now the winged people of the sky shall
sing
My cheerful anthems to the gladsome spring.

QUOTED BY IZAAK WALTON, AS
BY SIR HARRY WOTTON.

No reason seemed now to exist for Holden’s impatience
to depart, yet he longed for the quiet of his hut
on the island. The excitement of his feelings,
which, while it acted as a stimulus, sustained him,
had passed away, and the ordinary consequences of overtasking
nature followed. Besides, he had lived so long
in solitude, that any other mode of life was to him
unnatural, and especially the roar and tumult of a
populous place, disturbed him. The loudest sounds
to which he had been accustomed were the rippling
of the tide on the beach, or the sigh of the wind,
and the songs of birds; and the difference between
them and the noises he now heard, formed a contrast
equally harsh and discordant. But by no word
did he betray his wish. Both Mr. and Mrs. Pownal
were desirous to delay the departure of himself and
son, and it seemed to him ingratitude to act in any
respect in opposition to the inclinations of persons
to whom he was so greatly indebted. Several days,
therefore, passed after the happening of the events
recapitulated in the last chapter, and yet he remained
in New York. But his feelings could not escape
the observation of his son. Better acquainted
than their host and hostess with the peculiarities
of his father, he seized an opportunity to speak of
the necessity of a speedy farewell.

“You are right, I do not doubt, Thomas,”
said Mr. Pownal, in reply to the observation of the
young man, “and yet I never felt so loth to let
you go. While with me you seem still in some wise
to belong to me, and I feel a reluctance to lose you
out of my sight.”

“Do you think it possible,” exclaimed
young Pownal—­whom his father, out of a
sentiment of delicacy towards his friends, had insisted
should be called by the name of his preserver, he had
so long borne, for which reason we shall continue
to use it—­“do you think it possible
I can ever forget how deeply I am indebted, that I
shall ever cease to love you with all the affection
of a son, on whom you have lavished every possible
kindness?”